


For Your Viewing Pleasure

by panchostokes (badwolfrun)



Category: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
Genre: Angst, Canon Expansion, Episode: s05e24-25 Grave Danger, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Missing Scene, Nick Stokes Whump, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:54:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27535612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badwolfrun/pseuds/panchostokes
Summary: They watch in exhaustion as Nick continues to fight through the trauma, and realize something may have remained buried in his premature grave that they will never recover.But Nick will.Some expansion on what we saw, and some missing scenes from Grave Danger.
Relationships: Gil Grissom & Nick Stokes, Greg Sanders & Nick Stokes, Nick Stokes & Catherine Willows, Sara Sidle & Nick Stokes, Warrick Brown & Nick Stokes
Comments: 10
Kudos: 19





	For Your Viewing Pleasure

**Author's Note:**

> warning for mentions attempted suicide

The idea of getting a peek behind the curtain of Nick Stokes’ private life was a pleasurable prospect from the first time his suffering was put on display for all to see in the A/V lab. 

Greg would be lying if he said that he hadn’t walked by to peer through the blinds, despite Nick’s vice grip warning just hours before, when the team was first examining the tapes filmed by Nigel Crane.

When looking back in cringing shame at the decision, he reminds himself that was starting to do that  _ before  _ they found out that Nick was his next star of his home movies.

He remembers how he watched the team walk together out of the lab, Grissom’s voice loud and sharp and slow, advising the concussed man that Crane’s been in his home—he dreads to think of how Nick must have felt, even with the heavy amount of painkillers, finding out that his home had been invaded—but once the cats were away, the lab mice came out to play, and Greg found himself sauntering into the A/V lab, under the guise of saying that Archie shouldn’t have to watch the tapes alone.

It’s an excuse he’d use again, only this time on his own behalf, when he watches the live feed of the countdown on Nick’s life. 

He didn’t know what he expected, but from what he had seen in his drive-by haunting of the halls, he thought it would just be the stalker, sitting in front of the camera, talking to himself about his latest crush. Maybe some close up shots of his victim walking outside. Going shopping. Picking up dry cleaning. Still wasn’t right of course, still illegal, but Greg would have gotten a chuckle out of watching how Nick shops. Seeing what clothes he picks up. Answers to the questions he’s too afraid to ask but still wants to know.

The tapes went far beyond that sort of content. 

Specifically watching the tape filmed in a bird’s eye view above Nick’s bed ruined any sort of appeal Greg may have thought there was to gain in getting a glimpse into Nick’s suddenly-not-so-private life. Watching him toss and turn—Greg couldn’t help but wonder if he somehow  _ knew  _ something was up as he squirmed in his bedsheets, muttering indistinguishable words and phrases and sentences that Crane so graciously transcribed:

_ “He’s talking about a girl...named...Melissa? Melissa...ah, yes. His high school prom date.”  _

It was in that moment, forgoing the fact that this psychopath just out of the blue knew the name of Nick’s high school prom date, that Greg froze up. The game was over. It wasn’t even a game to begin with.  _ Nick’s life  _ was not a game. Not a spectacle. Not something to be entertained by. 

He and Archie often played fun at viewing the footage, observing people’s lives when they’re not aware they’re being recorded, or even if they were aware, and they found extra amusement in some of the more risque cases. But with the  _ personal  _ level of detachment they were expected to have when it was someone they  _ knew _ , Greg had to wonder if he was in the correct field.

A field that technically wasn’t his own— _ his _ field of DNA, while still intimate on some level, was easier to disengage. People became strings of sequences and numbers. He didn’t have to see their faces. Now that he’s more involved in field work, he’s seen worse in live action.

Though looking at Nick’s semen wasn’t any easier, when he had to do that. 

And on a scale of difficulty, watching this live feed of this...this torture bordering some sort of snuff film—there’s really no other way he can think of to describe it—can’t even be defined. 

One of his colleagues, one of his  _ friends, is _ trapped in a world of pixels and code, buried under layers and layers and  _ layers _ in an endless landscape of dirt and sand. Harder to find than a needle in a haystack. 

He can hear Nick’s voice, growling in a low whisper as the button is pressed for the first time since the team dissipated and Greg took first watch alongside Archie.

_ “Stop invading my privacy, man, I don't like it.” _

It is a choice, after all, to keep pressing the button. It’s not mandatory. All it seemingly does is turn a light on. 

And, for all they know, triggers his additional air supply.

They might be doing him a favor, even if he doesn’t “like it.”

_ “I’m just trying to do my job around here.” _

Are these the dangers his mother always warned him about, when he told her that he was working for the crime lab? The internalized paranoia that he would become a victim himself, which up until this point he had written off even despite the explosion just a few years prior. That was a  _ lab accident.  _

This is an  _ abduction.  _

And not only that, but it happened at a scene of another crime. It happened on the clock. Nick got  _ paid  _ to be tossed into this penalty box.

He morbidly wonders if Ecklie will keep the clock running, or punch Nick’s card out if he hasn’t already. Don’t want the lab’s money to go to waste. He already knows they’re not going to pay the ransom. They’ll have to start a collection jar to fundraise.

_ “I don’t need the extra attention.” _

Greg’s heart sinks when the screen goes black with the reverbing echo of Nick’s voice. A weird phantom grip pinching his shoulder fades. The curtains are once again closed, but out of some selfish desire, he immediately presses the button again.

It’s all he can do, after all.  _ Watch.  _

Attention be damned, and besides, Nick may have lost, has become lost, and is losing a lot of things; including, quite possibly, his  _ life _ .

But one thing he will never lose is Greg’s attention. 

* * *

It doesn’t take long for Catherine to not only see Nick as the whole of a split image of Judge Stokes and Jillian Stokes, but to see herself within them too—and even Grissom, to a point, in an almost surrogate parental role to Nick, rooted in just how deeply this whole ordeal  _ hurts  _ on a level that goes beyond a co-worker relationship, beyond even a just a casual friendship. 

Nick means a hell of a lot more to her than “just a friend.”

She’s always taken the younger CSIs under her wing, coaching them and advising them in more direct ways than the riddles and subtleties of Grissom’s teaching style, and she has always felt that Nick was easily her best student, fully aware that her mentorship role in his eyes is less than that of Grissom’s.

Instead she takes pride in the way she’s been able to give Nick a literal shoulder to cry on. To watch him open up to her in ways that, as he once told her, had never done before. A level of trust reserved only for the strongest of relationships, and while they had their differences and clashes as of late in their rivaling stubbornness, she still looked at him like the son she never had, in a way that not even Grissom could understand, because he isn’t a parent.

_ Catherine _ is. 

She is grateful that she was the first to meet his parents, to imprint on them the level of care they take of their son, both on a professional and emotional level. They haven’t just lost a co-worker, they lost a  _ family  _ member. 

Lost is both putting it lightly and not putting it correctly on the board at all. She understands how easily Judge Stokes gets frustrated when he finds out they have  _ nothing,  _ no leads, no ideas as to who could have done this—he revealed to Catherine before Grissom entered the room that they had also checked in on his stalker, had also gone through their own list of death threats that could have endangered their son’s life. They’re just as empty handed as the lab is, except for the money they came with. 

The harshness in the Judge’s voice, the commanding firmness, the trace of snark both reminds her of Nick in times of his own frustration and of herself during interrogations—which this suddenly feels like—but it’s Jillian’s softness, her teary, but relative calm compared to the amalgamation of fire and ice sitting besides her, that gives them the shared connection that only mothers can have. 

She even opened with that fact when she first introduced herself, “Judge Stokes, Mrs. Stokes, I just want you to know...I have a child of my own, who had...who had been in danger before—”

“Were they  _ kidnapped?”  _ the Judge huffed like some sort of dragon, puffing his chest as he straightened in his seat. She thought of Nick in his defensive manner.

“Not...quite but there were a few moments...more than a few, really, where I thought...I thought it was the end, and I didn’t give up then, and I’m not giving up now.”

“Giving up? What do you mean, ‘giving up?’” Jillian’s eyes widened, shining, and in them she saw Nick’s emotionally driven perseverance. In a few moments' time after Grissom entered the fray, she made it clear that she shared the same determination, “We’re not here to show support. We’re here to get Nick home.”

It broke her heart to have to drag them down to the same level of uselessness, helplessness, impotence that they can’t do anything.

Anything except watch him,  _ their son,  _ die. 

She slightly regrets the decision she and Grissom made to show them the footage, but Nick’s parents were just as stubborn as their child. They wouldn’t have backed down, and besides, they had a right to know. 

And it’s all they could have given them. 

She’s selfishly grateful that it’s not her  _ real  _ child on the screen, the one that she worked so hard to create and birth and keep loved and safe, but even that doesn’t ease her nerves as she watches the seconds tick...tick... _ tick… _

It happened when she watched as his real parents did what the surrogate parents were feeling on the inside, the crippling despair that shoved them into a dark corner to cry, but the release of tears wouldn’t be enough. Nothing would be enough, unless it meant bringing him home.

She knew it was an option from the minute she saw the ransom amount scroll on the screen. 

She didn’t want to do it, knowing the protests that would come from Grissom the minute she slammed the money on his desk.

She didn’t want to do it, because it meant confronting the father who was never actually her  _ dad.  _

She didn’t want to do it, even though she knew if the tables were turned, he’d do the same for her. 

So she does it anyway. 

She fights to keep her name attached, not out of some sort of pride but she wanted to be the one to stare the monster in the eyes, to dangle the money and scrutinize him with the same ferociousness she absorbed from within herself and from the other parents.

But she backs off, knowing that yes, as Grissom so aptly points out, it would look like Sam Braun bribed the lab. 

Knowing that yes, she probably wouldn’t make it out of the pay off without making another bad decision and getting her hands dirtier than they’ve already become. 

Knowing that yes, this is the only thing that is going to help Nick, and while Grissom isn’t as personable, that  _ yes,  _ he does care about Nick just as much as he would a son, if he ever had one. 

Not for the first time that day, and not for the last, she bites the bullet and instead does the one thing nobody else can do. 

She grabs Jillian’s hand as they settle at the station on standby, and offers the very support that the woman couldn’t give herself. She listens as Jillian admits that they hadn’t even spoken since Christmas, worried that she can’t even the last thing she said to him in the midst of seven conversations with seven different adult children. She empathizes, knowing that if Nick were here, he’d be offering the same comfort. 

She doesn’t even have to point that out for Jillian to come to the same realization and lean on the same shoulder she’s offered to Nick before.

Mothers know best, after all. 

* * *

He tried getting some sleep around the tenth hour. They all did, in turns just as they took turns in keeping an eye on Nick. Brass was kind enough to share his office space with all of them, let them take a quick, hour to two hour nap but sleep didn’t come easy to any of them and least of all to Warrick. 

Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Nick.

Every time he opened them, he saw Nick. 

It started with the quarter, that  _ damn quarter  _ that decided their fates, where the engraved face morphed into that of the short-cut hair of his best friend. 

Now, as he looks around the photos strewn around Brass’ office, he sees him there, too. Sees the group photo made up of Nicks, crafted from the image he once saw of him as a rookie cop. Sees an  _ actual  _ picture with him of the lab personnel taken before he had been transferred, his baggy shirts and pants of the late nineties, an arm around Warrick himself. Sees a statue on Brass’ desk that suddenly looks like a miniaturized, petrified version of his best friend.

He turns his body away to instead look at the back of the couch, and as he consigns himself to the enclosed space, he can’t help but wonder, is this what it feels like in that...in that  _ coffin?  _ Unable to fully extend his limbs, his face nearly smushing into the inescapable surface, it’s somehow...suffocating.

He flips over to the other side, though he continues to toss and gives up any hope of sleeping just as his watch goes off, indicating the end of the countdown timer.

He’s not surprised when he finds out that Grissom is going to pay off the ransom, and reluctantly stays behind, waiting by his car, packing all the necessary rescue gear he can think of needing—most importantly, a shovel—and Sara does too, impatiently pacing in the parking garage, biting down on the tip of her thumb before her phone finally rings, and Warrick starts his car.

He watches Sara’s reaction as her pacing ceases, her face falling and gaping in worry, her face gone pale. 

“Are you...are you  _ okay?”  _ he hears her voice cracking, and he jumps out of the car, rushing over and mouthing silently, “Grissom?”

She nods, her eyes wide with shock.

“O-okay…” a shaky exhale, she shuts her phone. “Grissom, uhm...Grissom said the kidnapper blew himself up. Left us with nothing. Didn’t even want the money.” 

“You’re shitting me,” Warrick hisses, spinning and slamming the side of his car when Sara shakes her head. He huffs and puffs for a few moments before softening his voice, “Is he okay?”

“I-I’m gonna head over there, help process the scene,” she clears her throat to change the subject.

Code for,  _ I don’t know. _

He follows her to the warehouse, they spot Grissom on the tail end of an ambulance, muttering, “he blew himself up and left us with  _ nothing”  _ over and over again, which is more disturbing than the bloodbath they walk into. He immediately gets to work on the Ford, nearly expecting Nick to roll out from underneath—he always liked working underneath the cars, and Warrick can’t help but wonder if that preference is going to change if they get him back.

No. Not if. 

_ When. _

Maybe it’s the exhaustion of running on fumes, maybe it’s the desire to be working alongside his best friend, and maybe it’s just the simple frustration of working with someone who’s less experienced...but he loses his cool with Greg for the first time, and definitely not the last. Pleasantries and patience are the last on his mind even though he senses the same hostility in Greg’s voice firing right back at him. 

Despite the snapping, they both wordlessly reconcile and try to determine a possible search radius from the twenty three miles spent driving on his last trip, but even knowing the general direction he was heading, they still need another waypoint to narrow it down.

Although Warrick is more than willing to just get a shovel and start digging. It might be faster at this rate.

Once the map reaches a dead end, he tries to help with evidence collection but with practically the entire lab there and an inability to focus—Grissom’s words echoing as he gets dizzy looking at all of the blood, knowing it’s not Nick and also feeling sick from thinking how it could have easily been Grissom plucked and tossed into a multitude of evidence collection bags. 

The money strewn like a carpet over the entire floor taunts him; no amount of money could buy back Nick’s life. The money didn’t even matter at all. Just a test, to see how much they cared about him. 

If they didn’t pay the ransom, would the kidnapper have just killed Nick? Or just continue to let him die slowly and painfully, buried alive beneath the earth while his family watches?

He walks over the bloodied papers and examines the laptop dripping in blood, the screen still intact but just barely enough to get a look at Nick. Still in the box. 

Still alive.

His eyes pulse, his vision clouding in inverted stars, so he decides a break might be best. Takes the evidence back to the lab under the guise and actual intent of getting it processed as soon as possible, but really to get a full check on Nick. To keep watching him.

He makes it back to the lab without passing out, first stopping in the bathroom to splash his face, then the break room to rummage and find something to eat. Even though he assigned himself the task of watching Nick, he doesn’t make it there right away. He overhears some of the techs talk about how the feed is still on, a thought that hadn’t even crossed his mind until this moment. He’s grateful they can still check in on this overtime of borrowed time. With the kidnapper dead, this is the only lead they have to go on. This is their only proof of Nick’s survival. 

A nagging thought continues to itch the back of his head, that while the timer might be gone, there’s still a timer that they can’t see, ticking down the seconds until Nick runs out of air. 

One that he worries they won’t be able to beat.

He doesn’t make it into the A/V lab for about fifteen minutes after having that thought, making himself some tea because his heart is already pounding loud and fast enough, but he needs something to keep himself awake and  _ alert.  _

“How’s he doing?” he asks without bothering to hide the weariness in his voice. 

“Hard to say. About the same, I guess,” Archie shrugs. Warrick can’t say he envies the man, who hadn’t left his post since they opened the feed, but wouldn’t trust anybody else outside of the core team with the task. While he loves Nick and doesn’t want to risk something terrible happening without his watching, there’s only so much he can take at a time one or both of them just...snap entirely from the madness. This whole ordeal is a testament to his strength and Nick’s, and if this was one of their friendly competitions, their silly bets with each other...he’d put it all on Nick.

“I’m gonna go get some coffee,” Archie excuses himself, and Warrick feels slightly selfish, glad to have a moment alone with his best friend, who appears to be trying to fall asleep himself, closing his eyes. Remaining still.

Perhaps that would be for the best, if he fell asleep. Help pass the time—does Nick even know how long it’s been? He has his watch, is he keeping track? 

And if he is, has he given up hope of a rescue yet?

Warrick knows he sure as hell wouldn’t have lasted this long, especially with the damn light that— _ Sorry, buddy, it’s just to make sure you’re okay _ —he turns on yet again after a sip of his drink, it’s an autonomous process at this point. 

Nick seems to say something, but Warrick can’t quite read his lips. Probably some obscenity towards the bulb in the box, illuminating his prison cell. He almost smiles at the thought, knowing the tenacious snark of the much-too-stubborn-for-his-own-good Texan.

Nick falls back into the same silent stupor of uncomfortable shifting that he’s done in the thirteen hours, But after a few more cycles...something happens. 

Nick takes something out of his pocket, something with a wrapper—did he keep a snack bar in his pocket? Or gum? The man is always eating, Warrick wouldn’t be surprised, and in this situation, it probably helps stave off the starvation, though dehydration is the bigger threat. He starts chewing, but doesn’t swallow. Instead, Nick takes out what he is now certain is the pink bubblegum he enjoys, and sticks it in one ear, then the other.

It seems harmless enough, but he can’t help but wonder what the purpose is. Is he tired of hearing his own breathing? Tired of hearing the fan next to him?

“What are you doing, Nicky?” Warrick can’t help but wonder out loud, knowing that Nick won’t answer. 

A few seconds pass, and then...he pulls up a gun.

Warrick gets to his feet, his voice rises, as if that could somehow break through the digital barrier and Nick could hear him—

“What are you doing, Nicky?” he asks again, louder, quicker, more frantic. When the hell did he get a gun? Why is he just using it  _ now?  _

Nick responds by turning the gun, the angle is awkward, but he is unmistakably pressing it to his chin. 

Nick’s going to kill himself, and unknowingly is giving Warrick the pleasure of watching.

“Don’t do it, Nicky!” 

Nick waves the gun away, his head seems to lift up with his eyebrows scrunching, his eyes a disassembled puzzle. Warrick stands up entirely, praying that this means Nick is having second thoughts—

There’s a flash that drowns out the already overlit scene, still eerily void of sound—Warrick jumps backwards out of his body—the screen goes pitch black—

And Nick’s  _ gone.  _

“YOU SON OF A BITCH!” Warrick shouts, not caring that the rest of the lab falls suddenly silent, his fingers curling into fists, ready to just punch through the monitors,  _ all  _ of the monitors that cut him off—cut  _ Nick  _ off—the light’s gone out on his life, by his own doing—the light’s gone from Warrick’s life too, without Nick around—

But then, the black blooms into green, revealing Nick’s laughing face—which Warrick first mistakes for a scream, before he turns his head towards the fan, sucking in the air like a hamster drinking water. 

Warrick laughs, realizing Nick must have shot out the light, not his life—and thankfully, not his feet in the process as he suddenly recalls how Nick had to retake his firearm proficiency.

“You’re still alive,” he says, more to himself than anybody else.

Archie returns and Warrick fills him in, they’re both surprised to find that with the light gone, the switch mechanism is gone too. No more “watch” button, now they’re permanently subscribed to the marathon of Nick’s entrapment.

Grissom comes to relieve Warrick, and he falls silent when he meets the man’s eyes. He didn’t tell Archie the details of the near miss, but the look on his face speaks volumes to his mentor, who gives a knowing, sad nod before gently patting Warrick on the shoulder. 

“Why don’t you take a break, get some fresh clothes?”

“Yeah,” he agrees in a dry voice.

He finds his way to the locker room, leans against his locker, staring at the clothes he had changed out of at the start of his shift, moving them aside to find the spare change of clothes. 

His mouth hangs open as he hears the echoes of the story he told Nick. Of the laughter from both men, of  _ Nick’s  _ laughter coming from the now green lit confinement on the computer screen as he presses the gun to his chin—

He slams the locker shut, and falls down to the bench. 

He doesn’t know how long he stays there, replaying not just their earlier conversation, but  _ all  _ of the conversations they’ve held in the room. All of the discussions, the jokes, the jabs—both playful and not—doing nothing but reminding him of what he’s going to lose if they don’t find him in time. 

It’s Sara’s voice that ultimately breaks him out of his thoughts, telling him about a new lead they have—the kidnapper’s daughter. 

She invites him to the interrogation, and he accepts, happy for a change in the channel, to watch somebody else for a change. But he doesn’t go in the room, instead watches through the glass with intent of leaving to help Catherine and Greg back at the warehouse the minute it’s over—he’s even readily dressed in a jumpsuit, and knows that if he was in the room, he would just lose his temper more than he already has, even more than he did with Greg.

Sara and Brass, as sharp and tough as nails, hold nothing back. They waste no time in getting right to the point, but even they get nothing. Not a drop of sympathy from the woman who doesn’t even seem to care about a reduced sentence. 

Instead, she seems to hold the same vitriol that her father seemed to hold towards this man that she’s never even met. 

And possibly even the same disregard for her own life.

“I hope your friend  _ dies.”  _

Warrick misses the two way mirror, and punches the wall before he’s whisked away by the uniformed servant outside the door. 

That bitch doesn’t know that his death is exactly what they’re watching. 

* * *

She doesn’t have to be a lip reader to know that Nick is leaving his final words on a tape recorder that none of them had known about until this moment.

Just like they didn’t know about the gun.

Sara knows that Grissom is behind her, hearing his words in the silent performance. She doesn’t envy his ability to read lips right now, can’t even begin to imagine what Nick might be saying, selfishly hoping that he’s leaving words for them, for her. 

Hell, it’s hard enough for her to imagine that he’s doing this to begin with.

Giving up.

They never outwardly discuss it, she only knows about it through a certain remark made by Grissom and a darkness in Warrick’s eyes that she’s never seen, but they all know how close they came to losing Nick already within the prolonged countdown on his life. 

She keeps telling herself,  _ he needs to hang on just a little longer… _

But how much longer can he wait? 

She doubts that the air supply is  _ endless.  _ Gordon obviously didn’t intend on his survival despite it, with how he blew himself up before telling them where he is. The parallel is unmistakable, he had to watch his daughter’s entrapment and so must they—but Nick’s prison cell is void of any sort of human right, besides the one for air. 

And in roughly an hour’s time, they’ll find out that  _ they  _ were the ones who were robbing him of that as they selfishly chose to keep an eye on him over leaving him in the dark. 

She’s not even sure which she would have preferred. Trapped in darkness, masking the details of the dirt slammed against the glass walls or in an abundance of light giving her full view of the hell she’s been condemned to. 

She is sure that she wouldn’t have lasted this long. 

And by the looks of it, Nick might finally be at the end of his rope. The tape recorder is dropped. His mouth expands. He appears to be flailing, just as he did when they first opened the feed in the world’s worst wake up call—she calls out, turning to Grissom as if he could somehow stop it—“He’s going into convulsions! He’s losing it!”

Grissom’s the first to notice that the feed isn’t actually getting more pixelated, that the sudden swarm of black pixels surrounding Nick like an anti-halo are  _ moving.  _ His face falls into a mixture of fear and surprise that Sara’s never quite seen before, as he says the words:

“Ants. My god, he’s being eaten alive.”

As if being buried wasn’t bad enough.

She helplessly watches, wanting to leave but still wanting to stay, as Nick continues to scream until the swarm moves from behind him to  _ on  _ him. Crawling up his neck. Onto his face. Onto his hands. Bouncing in his hair like fleas. Even his shirt seems to show some sign of movement, its edges bleeding out of shape.

She removes herself from her chair but just stands by, standing next to Grissom, knowing that he can’t, but wishing that he could just...stop all of this. 

Or to give her some sort of comfort. Anything. Words. Touches. Glances. 

But his eyes are locked on Nick. And so are her’s. 

Not for the last time that night, she’s confused as he starts to smile—she is fully aware that some small, sick part of the entomologist is probably academically intrigued by this but also knows that’s completely outweighed by his concern for Nick.

Nick put something in his ears, they can’t determine what, exactly, it seemed to be something white—Sara smiles inwardly knowing that he probably has a pair of gloves in his pocket, he often forgets until they’re out having a drink and he pulls them out and they all laugh…

Laughing seems like something she’ll never do again without him around.

He then plugs his nose with something black—pieces of his shirt, perhaps, and then he falls suddenly...still. Small twitches and movements, but beyond that…

“That’s it, Nicky,” Grissom tells him, “Stay still. They won’t bite...as much.”

She feels a breaking point but can’t seem to leave the room. Can’t seem to look away. She does what she knows Nick would do, start to pace, concoct a plan. 

“Is there...is there some way you can…” she starts to address after thirty minutes’ silence. “Identify the ant? Could we maybe find him that way?”

Grissom doesn’t say anything, just shoots her a quick glance with reddened eyes before gluing his eyes back to the screen. 

She stops her pacing, crossing her arms behind the monitor as Nick continues to thrash behind her—but the observer remains silent, and she gives up in a sigh of frustration, intent on doing  _ something.  _

She finds her way to the garage, where Warrick, Catherine and Greg are examining the prototype they dug up. She knows it’s not possible, nor that this is the box Nick is trapped in, but she can’t help but see his body, just as distorted and infested as he is now, confined within it. Curled up just like the skeletons and skinned corpses alike that they often find buried in the ground.

With him remaining so still...how can they be sure he hasn’t already—

“How’s Nick?” Greg asks, rolling out from underneath the box. She had fallen into the same stupor the room was in when she arrived, and snaps out of it with a startle in her heart at Nick’s name. 

“He’s, uhm…” Sara begins, unsure of how to tell them. She sniffles, turns away from the box. Her lips quiver. 

“He’s not—” Catherine gasps and Sara shakes her head.

“No, he’s...He’s still alive.”

“Barely,” Warrick echoes her own sentiment. He gestures to the prototype. “We reckon he’s got about another ninety minutes before he…”

_ Runs out of air.  _

“What’s going on with him?” Greg asks as he rises to his feet. 

“I think it’s better if you see for yourselves,” Sara chokes out, and leads them back to the A/V lab.

They gather around the display computer, their eyes transfixed on the screen attached to the wall. The reactions they first had when the feed popped up doesn’t amount to the terror on all of their faces now.

Grissom, meanwhile, seems to have finally cracked. 

“Oh, come on, pal…”

Sara turns back, while the new twist of fate continues to sink into Warrick, who slams his hand down on the desk. Into Catherine with watering eyes, cupping a hand over her mouth. Into a pale green faced Greg, who is too frozen in shock to make any sort of motion to look away from this  _ can’t-look-away  _ horror show.

“Yeah. That’s it.”

Grissom seems to lean forward, he’s talking once again as if he’s talking to Nick—but what could Nick be doing that he’s encouraging with such fervor?

She resumes her post next to Grissom as he continues his creepy coaxing, “Keep coming. Show me what you're made of. Come on, buddy.”

She’s just about to ask, “what the  _ fuck  _ are you doing?” when an ant crawls onto the camera, and he presses a button on the keyboard.

“Gotcha!” he exclaims. The printer gives him a print out. He eagerly springs up from his seat, waving the paper at the team.

“Gather up what we got, get a map, and meet me in the layout room in two minutes.”

He rushes into the hallway, but calls back to the team that he’s left in the despairing darkness, so loudly, so commanding that the entire lab can hear—

_ “We’re going to dig him up.” _

* * *

They watch in the highest hope as the first shovel breaks ground. This is it, after nearly twenty-five hours, they’ve found Nick Stokes. 

They watch in dread as the timer goes off. Warrick stops digging, they all share a look, wondering if they made a mistake. What if they’re at the wrong nursery? What if they’re at the wrong dig spot? What if Nick already ran out of air?

They watch in relief as Warrick pushes away the final mound of dirt—ignoring how he asks Nick to “put  _ that  _ down,” knowing exactly what  _ “that” _ is. Warrick shouts for an extinguisher to kill the ants that seem to make Nick spasm in pain despite the joy of being rescued.

They watch in caution, heeding Grissom’s warning not to suffocate Nick, as if he’s not suffocated enough already. Sara calls for the paramedics, though she knows deep down Nick’s going to refuse care as soon as he gets out. He’ll just dust off the dirt and walk away. She can’t wait to see that happen.

They watch in masked joy as they remain sharp, determined while they ready their positions to lift the lid.

They watch in horror as Catherine tells them to get out of the hole that’s about to explode.

They watch in panic as Warrick refuses to leave, as Nick starts to  _ scream.  _

They watch in undefinable emotion as Grissom shows that the tin man has a heart after all, he calls out to the hysteric man and calms him down enough to listen to a plan, the only plan they have to beat the bomb. They all put a lot of faith in Grissom, but none more so than Nick. They watch as Grissom makes him promise not to move. They know he’s going to. 

They watch in their collective heartbreak as the lid is opened, and Nick reaches a hand out, calling in a desperate cry,  _ please. Please. Please let me out.  _ They want to, so badly, but nobody wants to be reminded of the threat Nick is sitting on top of. Warrick soothes him. He displays just how strong his will is, as he does what he’s told. As he closes his eyes with a deep breath, and allows himself to be truly  _ buried alive,  _ with no box. No air supply. 

They watch in trepidation as the dust settles and they see his body. Unmoving. Grissom and Brass are the first to rush over—the hard boiled Detective lets out a wry laugh as they see Nick’s hands twitching, see his mouth gaping and sucking in the freshest air he’ll ever taste. Grissom puts his hand on Nick’s shoulder, then Warrick, then Catherine, then Sara, then Greg. All selfishly overwhelming the man with touches of love, but he doesn’t really seem to mind. They all brush the dirt off his body like he’s some excavated corpse, gently, swiftly. Nick can’t seem to do it himself, keeping his hands against his chest, as if he were still confined with no other option.

They watch in worry as Nick doesn’t seem to stop shaking. More bumps shaded to his skin rise all over, his teeth are chattering. They suddenly realize that between the sudden absence of the light, the fire extinguisher, the night air...he might be suffering hypothermia. Greg quickly finds a jacket, puts it on him as he’s loaded to the stretcher. He whispers in his ear, playfully teasing about how he should know better than to show up to a night scene without one. Nick’s lips twitch into a smile, his ears perk up, momentarily distracting him from the tight swaddle around his chest. He’s too tired to put up a struggle just yet, he needs to rest. 

They watch in silence as the ambulance drives away. Nobody says anything—not even Warrick and Catherine, who accompany Nick to the hospital. They just share touches, Nick reaches out for someone,  _ anyone’s  _ hand. Catherine grips his leg, Warrick lets Nick wrap around his hand. They wordlessly watch as Nick keeps his eyes shut, sensitive to the bright light above. Mutters to himself. Warrick thinks he might even be singing. Meanwhile, back at the scene, Grissom breaks the heavy silence with just five words.

They watch in shock as Grissom doesn’t just ask, he  _ demands  _ that the team be reunited. 

They watch in even bigger shock when Ecklie dismisses them, to join the rest of the team at the hospital. 

They watch in exhaustion as Nick continues to fight through the trauma, and realize something may have remained buried in his premature grave that they will never recover. 

But Nick will. 

* * *

It feels weird, after watching Nick for so long through a fish-eye lens, to see the man in live motion. To see the details they didn’t quite see before in the digital feed, and even during the rush of the rescue, the only thing he can remember seeing is Nick’s face, contorted into an anguishing plea, pulling at his arm, pulling him in, damn near into the box with him. 

His arm still aches. He’s certain he has bruises. 

It wasn’t really until the dust had literally settled and he entered the hospital room, having spent previous hours watching behind another looking glass, waiting for his turn while others tried and failed to offer comfort, that he got to take a  _ really  _ good look at him.

Grissom took it upon himself to be the one to take the photos in the hospital room, not that they’re really needed in any sort of testimony, but it’s due process. He’s sure Nick would agree that he’d rather have Grissom be the one to do it, anyway, just as he will when he asks Nick for his witness account.

Close ups showing his injuries. The burns and cuts on his back from the explosion. The cracked, bleeding fingernails from scratching the lid. The welts on his face, his hands, his arms and underneath all of the clothes that were collected. The wrist with long faded imprints of his removed watch and the zip-tie that they found in the trunk of the vehicle that drove Nick to his doom. The dirt that would be hidden in creases long after this first night at the hospital. The glazed look in his eyes as if he were some creature of the living dead. 

He was still in enough shock during the documentation that he was unphased as he was undressed. Poked and prodded and manhandled and washed down with almost an inhuman discretion, but it wasn’t until he was laid on top of the bed, laid to rest, that he began to show some semblance of life, starting to squirm and thrash. It’s as if he had been put on some sort of pause when he was pulled out of the box, and now he’s returned to it; an overtired fit of an oxygen deprived brain that still thinks he needs to stay awake.

That still thinks he’s underground.

The nurse gives him a sedative before she leaves the room. 

He settles for a few moments, not meeting Grissom’s eyes. His lips quivering. Fingers clawing at his skin. Overstimulated by the brightness—Grissom dims the lights of the room which seems to calm him, but his eyes are still darting, relearning the world above ground.

Or examining his new coffin.

“Scratching will make it worse,” he advises as he gently reaches for Nick’s wrist, pulling it away from the welt that breaks open and bleeds. 

Nick huffs and wrestles his hand out of Grissom’s grasp, sidling himself backwards,  _ away, _ which stings but Grissom’s certain that he’s just so out of it, he may not even realize it’s  _ Grissom  _ sitting next to him. 

It’s the same reaction he had to the rest of the team—though a more extreme one when Doc Robbins came in the room, and Grissom can’t tell if that was due to the nature of the man’s job, how Nick might mistake a hospital room for the autopsy room, or if there was something else he wasn’t aware of—but he’s always thought they shared a respectful admiration of each other, not that Nick doesn’t get along with really...anybody, besides Ecklie, perhaps.

For that matter, neither does Grissom, but a new leaf may have finally been turned over, and maybe it will for Nick, too.

Even his parents couldn’t seem to reach him. The power of Pancho was lost, trapped in a moment of meeting hands on the opposite side of a scratched, condensed glass barrier. 

But none of them were offended. They all reached the same rationalization, that there’s no way Nick is going to immediately recover. 

He just needs some sleep, that’s it. 

They all do.

And one would think that after all he’s been through, Nick would certainly be passed out—especially with the dosage of sedative but Nick continues to display the same strength and perseverance he’s always held, and very well proved in the world’s longest day—and he fights it. 

The air conditioner startles him as it jostles to action. He cups his hands to his chest as he looks to the source with fright.

“It’s okay, it’s just the air,” Grissom soothes him. 

“A-air…” Nick breathes tightly. He clutches his shirt, and then looks down, examining the wad of cloth. He pulls it away from his chest. His eyes widen as he reaches in—Grissom sees his fingers pick at one of the wires—

“Nick...Nick, buddy, don’t do that—”

“Itches…!” Nick rasps out through pulled, thin lips. His face squeezes in on itself, in the same way it did when Grissom attached the clip to his belt. The fearful anticipation of, in his point of view, a further punishment, an actual  _ burial  _ as they poured two hundred pounds of dirt on the already traumatized man. 

In hindsight, there was really nothing else they could have done.

He succeeds in pulling off one of the electrodes, then another, and another, immediately setting off the alarm that calls a nurse to run in a few moments later. 

“Mr. Stokes…” the nurse begins in a chastising tone. “C’mon now, sweetie…”

Grissom knows, but the nurse doesn’t, that Nick probably equated the tingling of the adhesive to the crawling of tiny ant legs on his skin. 

The nurse pulls Nick’s hands away, he looks up like a lost child, fearful as she puppeteers his hands to his sides so she can reattach everything. 

Once the monitor resumes its normal process, the nurse reaches under the bed and pulls up a leather-clad cuff that she motions to wrap around Nick’s wrist—

And for the first time, Nick looks at Grissom, a wordless plea hidden behind the teary glaze in his irises.  _ Help me. _

“Are those necessary? Can’t you just...increase the sedation?” Grissom interrupts, and she pauses before she encapsulates his hand to the side of the bed.

“I’ve given him the highest dose that we can for now, he should be fully out in no time.”

“Okay, so can we—” he looks to the rest of the empty room, as if he’d get some back-up, “Can I just...hold his hands down? Until that happens?”

The nurse peers through the rims of her glasses up at Grissom, who has already protectively grabbed Nick’s free hand.

“Ma’am, with all due respect...He was already effectively... _ restrained… _ ” the word tastes bitter in his mouth, “...for the last twenty-five hours. I think having a more...human touch will offer more comfort.”

A beat of silence, the nurse continues her judgement of the elder man. 

“He has two hands. The other will need to be restrained,” she finally says. 

“Someone will be along shortly, I assure you,” Grissom nods.

He selfishly hopes nobody else comes, though. Doesn’t want Nick to become more overwhelmed than he is already. It’s actually the reason he’s sitting with him by himself, an effort to give him some space.

Everybody else is still here in the hospital, his real family, his surrogate family. They may have left the picture of the room, but not the frame.

“Fine. I’ll be coming back to check on him in an hour,” she drops the cuff and exits the room swiftly.

“Thank you,” Grissom calls back to her, and once the door is closed, he turns back to Nick with a small smile.

Nick doesn’t seem as relieved. 

Instead seems to be... _ watching  _ Grissom. Now that he’s made eye contact, with recognition shining in his eyes, his cheeks burn as red as the welts that speckle the surface of his skin. 

“G-Grissom?” he asks in a small voice.

“Yes, Nicky, my boy. It’s me, I’m here.”

Nick gulps, his eyes drooping as his head starts to bob. He suddenly inhales sharply, throwing his head back, he wipes his nose with the back of his free hand before holding it inches in front of his eyes, examining the welts.

“Smaller than I thought,” he mutters sheepishly, letting his hand fall into his lap. 

“They’ll fade. There’s some ointment on the table—”

“Water?” Nick interrupts, coughing and pointing to the cup just out of his reach.

_ “Don’t scratch,”  _ Grissom piques an eyebrow, only vaguely suspicious of Nick’s sudden deflection. He releases Nick’s hand and Nick sits up, scooching to the edge and reaches for the cup with trembling fingers—

He pulls a tight grimace as his fingers fumble and the cup tumbles to the ground.

“S-sorry…” he cries out, choking back embarrassed tears. “Legs huuuurt,” he then adds in a groan, looking at his covered, cramping legs.

“It’s okay, it’s been a long day,” Grissom pulls Nick’s hand back from another attempt at scratching, sandwiches it between his own.

“T-too...long…” Nick nods in sighing agreement, seemingly happy that Grissom’s willing to pretend nothing happened.

“Why don’t we try to get some sleep?” Grissom suggests softly, lifting a hand to lower the bed’s angle.

“Nuh...No…” Nick blurts, just as broken as his plea when the lid was opened. His hand wrestles out of Grissom’s hold, he instead grips his fingers on Grissom’s wrist, so tightly that his nails nearly penetrate his skin—

“I—I might not wake up,” he whispers in a low, frightened voice.

“You will wake up, Nicky. You will, I promise.” 

“Too soft…”

“It must feel good though, doesn’t it?”

Nick shakes his head. Grissom almost wants to laugh at his defiance. 

“How about we remove the pillow?” Grissom offers.

“T-too dark…” he stutters, his eyes transfixed on the glowing green bulbs of the monitoring equipment. 

“We can turn up the lights—?”

“Too buh-bright…”

Grissom represses a sigh, knowing his patience is only so thin because he’s so exhausted.

But not nearly as much as Nick, he reminds himself.

“How about you just close your eyes—” Grissom encourages, as Nick begins to droop once again—

“No!” he thrashes his head to the side, pulls on Grissom’s wrist, tightens his grip—Grissom grunts but Nick still doesn’t listen, he’s starting to hyperventilate—

“Can’t-do-any-thing—” he wails. “Can’t-fight-back—”

“You don’t need to fight anymore Nick—”

“Can’tbreathegonnadie—”

“Nick!” Grissom, a bit more louder than he needed to, so he lowers his voice again, “Nicky, you’re  _ safe.” _

He feels bad for it, but the sudden harshness snaps Nick out of himself, traps him in a sharp inhale.

_ “Breathe,”  _ Grissom commands, taking a purposeful deep breath himself, as if to show Nick how because he’s seemingly forgotten. Nick nods shortly and mimics the act, which they repeat until his breath becomes full, unstaggered. 

“Feels so stupid…” Nick mutters.

“It’s not. You’re not,” Grissom tells him. “You’re  _ tired.  _ You just need to sleep.”

Nick purses his lips, shakes his head, once again avoiding Grissom’s eyes.

“I can’t,” he whispers. 

“You can. You will, they gave you a sedative—”

It’s at this point Nick seems to realize that he had been drugged—he lifts a trembling hand to his mouth, clawing at an invisible rag that Grissom now realizes had knocked him out before. 

_ The white fibers on Nick’s vest were cotton, with traces of ether… _

Nick dares to start panicking again, before Grissom takes his hand off of his mouth. 

“It’s going to be okay.  _ You’re  _ going to be okay. You can stop this,”

“I’m...I’m sssorry,” he drawls, his voice slow and heavy. 

“Just get some rest, Nicky.”

“I dis’point’d ya,” his accent’s getting heavier, he’s not making the effort to mask it anymore. 

Grissom’s face falls. His heart sinks to his feet. 

“Never. Okay? You could  _ never  _ disappoint me,” he places his hand on top of the clammy, bumpy one that’s still gripping onto his own. 

“Even if I don’t sleep?”

Grissom can’t help but laugh, and the corner of Nick’s lips twitch up.

“Yes, but I still think you should try. You’ll feel better when you wake up.” 

“O-okay,” Nick nods, puffing out a few breaths, just as he did in the box. 

“Okay,” Grissom smiles, as Nick starts to let his body relax.

“Pluh...please…don’t...leave...me…” he breathes, as the fight finally fades, his eyes flutter closed. His grip on Grissom’s hand eases up, more than that—it goes limp, as limp and loose as the rest of his body as he finally seems to fall asleep. 

“I never will, Nick. I’m here, we’re all here for you,” Grissom tentatively moves his aching hand to Nick’s face, stroking the tuft of flopping hair away from his eyes, wiping a streak of dirt with it. 

Once he’s certain Nick is out, he lets out the breath he had been holding since he first entered the room. He leans back in his chair, wiping his face with his own trembling hand. He should be relieved, but suddenly watching Nick so still and silent again feels...wrong.

Well, not completely still. His hands are still twitching. His eyes are already rapidly moving behind his eyelids—he can’t even begin to imagine what sort of nightmares he’ll be suffering for...well, possibly for the rest of his life.

A hand on his shoulder gently startles him out of his thoughts.

“How’s he doing?” Warrick’s weary voice, rounding to the other side of the bed. He pulls a face at the spilled water on the floor. 

“He’s finally asleep,” Grissom nods to the man. 

Warrick nods, leans forward and rests his head onto his cupped hands, but keeps his eyes on Nick. 

“You should get some sleep, too,” Grissom suggests, raising his eyebrows and gesturing to the couch on the other side of the room.

Warrick shakes his head, and Grissom throws out the argument that he wouldn’t have won anyway, knowing that Warrick will not rest until he’s certain that Nick is whole again. 

Catherine, who had been the one to stand next to Grissom with a comforting hand, moves herself closer to the bed, pulling the blanket up and over Nick. He subtly reacts but ultimately settles.

“How’s his parents?” Grissom asks her. A small part of him curiously wonders if this bedtime routine was normal for a younger, even more rambunctious Nick Stokes. 

“They’re calling the rest of the family. Everybody’s going to be flying in to see him.”

“Think the hospital will have enough room for all of them?” Greg’s voice piques up. He and Sara enter the room, take their positions at the foot of Nick’s bed. 

He gets an odd sense of déjà vu, with the entire team huddled together. Waiting.  _ Watching. _

“He’s bleeding,” Sara mutters, spinning around to search the nearby cabinet and obtaining bandaids and rubbing alcohol. Grissom observes as she puts herself between him and Catherine to tend to his wounds, knowing that she just wants to do  _ something _ . 

Her eyes flicker to Grissom’s wrist, and then up to his eyes, a wordless observation of her own,  _ you’re bleeding too. _

He draws down the sleeve of his jacket. 

The room falls silent, and the rational, reserved part of Grissom nags at him that he should leave. They all should leave. They should make way for Nick’s  _ real  _ family.

But his heart tells him that’s false. 

_ What does Nick Stokes mean to you? _

Family. They’re his family, too.

His eyes move from Nick to look at the rest of the team. Even though they got Nick back, they all seem...deflated. A symptom of exhaustion, to be sure, yet he feels obligated to rally them all, boost their morale. Remind them that they didn’t lose, even though it still feels that way. 

He got his guys back, but at what cost?

He wonders when he should tell them about the discussion he had with Conrad. That they’ll all work with each other again. That the wounds dealt to their team over the past year—mistakes, arguments, failures... _ abductions… _ can all be mended. They can be a cohesive unit once again.

He wonders how Catherine’s going to feel about her demotion, or if they can somehow trade roles, or even split it—she was always better with the paperwork and politics. 

He wonders if Nick will even come back to work after this, or if this was the final straw. 

After all he’s been through in the past five years...he wouldn’t blame him.

His thoughts continue to unravel into both hopeful idealizations and painful reflections of what it took to get to this moment, what had to be endured and suffered. 

What he took for granted once before, and never will again. 

The silence is broken as Greg pulls out a bottle of water from his jacket, incidentally the bottle crinkles loudly and Nick’s subtle movements become violent twitches. Grissom shoots a warning glance at Greg who mouths “sorry” while Nick takes another sharp breath in. Shaking hands find their way out from the blanket and he knocks his knuckles against invisible glass.

It’s at this point, Grissom flashes back to the opening of the box. His eyes had been on Nick the entire time, but when he leaned down to attach the clip to his belt, he had spotted the cracks that spread from the busted light, around the edges, creeping up on all sides of Nick. 

He can’t even begin to imagine the terror that Nick felt in that moment. The guilt that his own action, an effort to ease his suffering, was the cause of the cracks that thinned the literal glass ceiling.

But really, it was their fault. They should have never kept the damn light on.

“I’m here…” his voice, smaller and meeker than it was behind the glass, whimpers through, still battling the sedation. “I’m right...right here…”

If he didn’t know any better, he’d think that he heard the sound of all of their hearts shattering. In a shocking display of this newer, uncovered emotional side to himself that he feels comfortable revealing to the rest of the team, he immediately grabs Nick’s upheld hand, and pulls it back down. 

“We know. We’re here, Nicky,” he tells him. “You can rest now.” 

The rest of the team follows suit, putting their hands on Nick, as gentle as they can, grounding him though they all know, as he’s definitely proven over the past day and a half, that he’s already strong enough on his own. 

They’re sure he appreciates the love and support nonetheless. 

* * *

They told him not to visit Amy Hendler.

They told him not to watch the Nigel Crane tapes.

They told him not to visit Kelly Gordon. 

And they told him  _ definitely  _ not to watch the recorded feed from the box.

But one of the only perks of being abducted is the extreme amount of leniency and servitude he’s been given—though he certainly doesn’t take advantage, except when he asked Archie to help him out and give him an under the table copy,  _ just this once,  _ of the case files and the feed. A secret they would take to the grave—a pun Archie didn’t seem to appreciate, but still obliged Nick’s wish as if he were on some sort of deathbed. 

Everyone seemed to treat him that way in the hospital.

It’s a selfish desire, not out of vain but out of a longing to just...understand. It’s the same reasoning he told himself when he visited the prisoners, when he watched Crane’s tapes. He just wants to understand,  _ why him?  _ What did they see in him that made him so...appealing to break? 

It’s a futile search but one he’ll continue anyway, knowing he’ll never get the answer he longs for, and despite the offerings—one he’ll gladly do  _ alone.  _

His friends already saw this movie anyway. 

And not only that, but everybody keeps telling him how incredible it was that he survived, how they could have  _ never  _ handled it, how  _ strong  _ he was...

He feels anything but. 

He feels  _ weak. _

He couldn’t fight back when he was taken from behind. Couldn’t escape the trunk. He couldn’t lift the lid. Could barely open a freaking gum wrapper. Tried to take his life when he thought it was over after fighting for so long _.  _ Damn near shot his foot off only to almost cause a cracking collapse that would have done him in long before the ants would have. The delirious singing. The guttural screaming. The terrified crying. The  _ whimpering.  _

He was reduced to a sobbing, blubbery mess who had to be called a childhood nickname just to snap out of hysteria before falling right back into it the minute his coffin was exhumed. 

So. 

He wants to see what they saw. 

He’s on the ground, leaning against the coffee table, his legs crossed and his hands cupped in front of him. He feels like a kid for a moment, getting ready to watch cartoons—and even more specifically, he’s reminded of the night he tried to watch his first “scary” movie as a child who was much too young for it. The eagerness that would turn to pure horror, but befallen to the luring hypnosis of the disturbing footage.

He stares at his reflection in the television monitor. His disheveled, neglected hair. The faint circular welts fading but still visible to him. The growing threat of untended stubble tickling his chin. The eyes resting on puffing dark circles shining with doubt that this is a good idea. 

He takes a deep breath, nods to the reflection, and presses play.

The black mirror is immediately overtaken with a flood of white, with no sound except his own nervous breathing and the scrolling of text rolling onto the screen.

_ ONE MILLION DOLLARS IN 12 HOURS. _

He never thought he was worth that much, yet somehow feels he’s worth even more than that.

_ OR THE CSI DIES. _

They told him it was random. That he wasn’t targeted. The verbiage on the now lost cassette tape supports that claim, but the hurt remains that this was just some...happenstance. Wrong place at the wrong time. 

It doesn’t fit the sense of belonging he held in the box. That it was made to him, the dimensions tailored to his height even though he had to just slightly bend his legs, keep one arm over his chest—Warrick sure as hell wouldn’t have fit, being nearly a head taller than Nick. 

So even if that coin flip ended differently, part of him believes he still would have been the victim.

_ DROP-OFF INSTRUCTIONS TO FOLLOW. _

It was ingenious, really, the way this had all been set up. A man with nothing to lose, doing what he thought was right to get justice for his daughter who had been wronged—as much respect and pride Nick takes in his job, he knows the system is flawed. At times, even corrupt. He doesn’t hold too much of a grudge on the obviously demented man, and especially not on the daughter who still has a chance for rehabilitation, for redemption.

Yet he does still harbor some anger on the disembodied voice who told him that he was going to die. Taunting him to do it himself. 

And also anger at himself, because he almost did.

_ AND NOW FOR YOUR VIEWING PLEASURE... _

His nostrils flare at the very thought that anybody may have gotten any sort of  _ pleasure  _ out of this—especially the kidnapper himself. Not only is he now suddenly protective of this footage, lest it fall into the wrong hands, but his imagination runs wild as he clenches his jaw. He grimly envisions the team sitting around the monitors with a bucket of popcorn and gleeful smiles on their faces; an image that haunts one of his many nightmares.

_ YOU CAN ONLY “WATCH” _

The button is clicked.

With just a hint of a whimper, he flinches reflexively, grabbing his bottle of beer so tight that it shatters in his shaking hand. 

He leaves the alcohol spilled and stained on his clothes, frozen in a flashback but he blinks through it to keep watching. He tries to dissociate himself from the oncoming footage, as the light turns on, the screen changing to show him, in a box within a box, with a twelve hour timer underneath. His face distorted from the odd angle of the lens, showing only his head and partially his chest. 

Showing him come to an already presumed, but then full realization what was happening. Where he was. What surrounded him. What  _ confined  _ him.

He watches the panic fill wide eyes, facing one wall then the other, and the other above him, the other behind. Watches his futile attempt—not the first—to push off the immeasurable amount of dirt above him. Watches as he flails and flounders in silent screams (and it’s at this point that he’s grateful they didn’t have sound to accompany the sights) until the tantrum finally gives up and he settles. Rubs the throbbing temples of his forehead. Reaches down to retrieve the objects that had been knocked around, pulling them closer for easier access. Watches as he scratches at the fan cover, seeing if he could remove it—

The image fades back to the white screen. The same words appear: 

_ YOU CAN ONLY “WATCH” _

The cursor is motionless for a few seconds before it’s swiftly clicked and he appears again, his head craned towards the fan before he starts to writhe at the sudden light, twisting his head away from the fan that had seemingly stopped the air flow.

He wonders why it took him as long as he did to make the connection. 

He knows the team didn’t until it was too late. 

_ “We didn’t know, Nicky. I’m...I’m sorry _ —” Warrick’s hushed voice waves into his ear. Of course he was the one to break the news to Nick about the feed, knowing that he would have found out eventually anyway, and wanting it to come from someone close. Someone who took pity.

He didn’t need the pity. He just needed answers. 

The rest of the first twelve hours is spent in a limitless loop. Light turns on, he reacts to the sudden intensity, it turns off, he breathes. Turns back on, and off, and on, and off, and on…

He has half a mind to just stop watching, knowing he has to be getting close to the point where he finally realized the light was draining the fan, where he would have shot the light, and then suddenly—the countdown ends and the address appears on screen. 

He thought that’s where it would have stopped recording, where the feed would cut off cause they would go to the location on Boulder Highway and pay the ransom and nearly get blown up in the process. 

And then he remembers how Warrick told him they were able to find his location because of the ants.

The address disappears and the feed of the camera continues, showing his past self none the wiser. Still waiting. Keeping track of time but somehow those first twelve hours didn’t feel nearly as long as the last in hindsight. In fact, that was the easy part. Back when he still had hope. 

He’ll figure out he never lost that hope, not really. Not until the fan died.

He takes a quick break to throw up, unable to tell if it was from the consumption of the entire six pack of beer, or from the nausea of knowing what comes next. 

He can stop. Can just turn it off. Go to bed. Nobody really knows he’s doing this besides Archie, who’s not going to say anything to anyone about it, not even Nick himself. Nobody told him to do this. This was all his choice. 

It’s also his choice to keep going. 

Even under the influence, he knows he won’t sleep even if he tried. 

And oh, he’s tried.

Every night in the past week. 

Besides, he’d just dream about the box anyway. Might as well watch it from a different point of view. 

Within another hour, he pulls up the pink bubblegum wadded up in his pocket. He chews. Sticks it in his ears. Nick sticks his finger in his now hollow ear as he suddenly loses his hearing to a long monotonous tone. His head becomes lighter as the maddening thoughts running through his head in that moment come back to full force.

_ Either I shoot this damn light, or I shoot my foot and bleed out.  _

It was a chance he was willing to take at the time, and one that would ultimately create a downfall that put him in the lowest pit of hell, which was the only place they could seem to find him.

Even though the decision making lasted only a few seconds, he remembers how it felt like an eternity. Remembers how he squinted at the light like it was a burning sun, how he spread his feet apart as much as he could. Thinking about the timing, thinking about how it would just get worse the longer he’s in there, especially with the rising threat of dehydration and starvation, the air would be more important than ever. Remembers the heat cooking his body. He remembers the sweat drenching his skin, how his shirt uncomfortably clung to his skin. How those brief moments of darkness were his only respite. How the darkness became a refuge. His salvation.

But on the camera, all they had seen is him pointing the gun to his chin. Pausing. Contemplating. He knows what it looks like. At that time, he wasn’t quite there. He was still exercising all of the patience he could in waiting for help, because he had been taken on the job. That sensitive cop would have eventually figured out he was taken, and if not, the coroner would have been asking for him. They would be looking for him. 

Wouldn’t they?

He feels bad, even though he doesn’t know who was watching at this point, or any of the points, really—it wouldn’t have been easy for them, watching this and thinking he was going to kill himself, unknowingly on camera. 

And especially when, in an instant—they didn’t even see the gun move, they just saw the screen go black. 

Even Nick’s taken aback, so much so that he gasps and in his drunken fatigue wonders if this was all just another hallucination. If his life had really ended in that moment. If he did in fact, shoot his foot and bleed out and these are his last waking thoughts before death—

But then, the black blossoms to green, showing himself sucking in the now precious air cooling his overheated body. Feeling the same joy, the same relief...hell, the  _ comfort  _ he found for a few hours. He remembers how suddenly  _ calm  _ he felt. How when the intrusive doubts started up again, he started to sing his favorite song, even crack the start of a smile. 

Though the song cut off quick because he was suddenly forgetting the lyrics. He fell silent, resigned to just let the glowstick die out and in the cool darkness, maybe he could finally just fall asleep and hopefully wake up in another place, a better place.

He remembers thinking,  _ yeah. I could do this for a few more hours. I’ve lasted this long. I can do this. I can make it. I will make it out of here. This isn’t the end. _

Just as ever, his pride became his undoing. After another stretch of endless time in which the observing Nick falls into the same ruse of relaxation, the man on screen cracks a new glowstick, re-illuminating the box, and re-igniting another fit. 

He watches his mouth move, echoing the broken pleas in his ears. 

_ Hey! Hey, I’m in here! Hey! _

Pounding on the lid. Singing even though his voice was giving out. Shouting. Doing whatever he could to be a beacon for the excavators who would dig him up and let him out and he could be  _ free  _ again—

Until he finally realized that the sounds he was hearing were not shovels scooping dirt. The man on the screen looks down, then up, muttering  _ no, no, no, no, no  _ as he watched the box crack around him, a sight which isn’t quite apparent on screen. What did they think was happening? Did they think he was losing his mind? 

He watches as the panic in his past self settles once again, and his movements become slower, more cautious. Limited. 

And this is where he remembers truly starting to unravel. Thinking that the box was going to just fall apart at any moment. Remembering the tape recorder. Thinking about what he would say. Flipping over the tape, playing with the buttons until he could finally start speaking. Struggling to keep his voice steady as he said goodbye to his parents. To the team. 

_ I know you did the best you could to find me. _

He hoped they would regardless, whether alive or dead, before he became another skeleton to be unearthed years later. 

He was already starting to feel a bit thinner by that point.

But he wanted to leave behind a good looking corpse. One that his mother would appreciate. One that wouldn’t traumatize his nieces and nephews, showing them that death is a natural part of life. That it’s okay. He was well aware that his time—all of their time—would come to an end. 

He watches as he says his goodbye to Grissom—the last thing he remembers saying out loud though the rest of his goodbyes were still writing themselves in his head—when suddenly the tape recorder drops. He begins to yell. Begins to shake. Begins to flounder and they probably didn’t see it at first—maybe not until they started to cover his face but this was it. 

The ants. 

He frowns as his face pulls into an itching grimace, feeling the phantom bites boil on his skin. Feeling his blood burning. His heart racing. Venom slithering into the streams of his veins.

His past self does what comes almost like an instinct which he credits to Grissom’s guidance. Plugging his airways and staying as still as he can. He thought the pain wouldn’t be as bad. 

And it wasn’t, all things considering.

Hurt like hell, sure, but he did what he’s always done. 

Endured.

Maybe it’s once again, the effects of the alcohol loosening his inhibitions, letting his inner self run rampant, though it had been hours since he stopped drinking. Maybe he’s finally sobering up, seeing reality for what it truly is. Maybe it’s how he actually gets to see just how long he lasted like this—in a self-imposed cocoon of persistence—but there’s a feeling Nick gets, an undefinable emotion that’s not as...cringey as his previous judgements on himself. 

He wasn’t thinking about it in the box, how far he had come to that point. Once he had to keep his eyes shut, all sense of time had been lost. His mind melting and regressing and creating exaggerated scenarios of what happens when a dead body is found, how it’s processed and autopsied and examined by friends and family alike. 

But now he’s able to look at it now from an outsider’s point of view. He’s able to see where he is at this moment, and where he had started. He’s able to see his survival through this trauma for what it was. 

A miracle.

One that doesn’t seem to have an end. 

He dares to pause, see how much time is left on the timer. Not much longer now. 

He could easily just stop watching at this point having a better feeling than he did before, but is admittedly curious as to where the footage ends. 

He’s surprised when he sees just how far it actually goes.

The fan dies.

He shakes his head. He cries. Pleads for more time. 

He knows he wasn’t going to get any.

And it’s time for him to make good on the promise to himself, on what would happen if the fan stopped and he ran out of air.

He spits out the ants that had found their way into his mouth. Turns his head to the fan one last time, sucking in as much air as he can.

Screams at himself as he pulls up the gun in a feat of strength that nobody would understand—it was hard enough to open the gum, fumbling to keep his moist fingers steady and gripping, and even worse under the attack of the ants. A tremoring finger gripping the trigger. Squeezing as he squeezed his eyes shut. Just as before, he pauses. Contemplating.  _ Waiting.  _

He was going to wait until the last possible second, until his body would begin to shut down for good. The only reconciliation as his life began to flash before his eyes. As the last shrivel of hope begged him not to go through with it before it dissipated entirely. 

It seems to go on forever, just as the rest of the footage but the time is cut immediately short, the camera starts to shake like an old VHS tape. Distorts the image, moving rapidly from one side to the next before it’s entirely swept away and the screen goes black.

And so does the television.

With a tear stricken face, he once again meets the eyes of his reflection.

He still doesn’t see the mountain of strength that they claim they saw, yet doesn’t quite see the man he saw before. 

Nick’s never quite believed in the idea of reincarnation, because after all, he’s still him. Still in the same body. Still the same name. But he knows he is different. Changed. Reborn in a way, having been rescued from the edge of life and death. With a new sense of optimism he realizes he’s been given something he will never take for granted. 

A second chance. 


End file.
